A four-day truce has taken effect in the besieged Gaza Strip after seven weeks of massacres committed by the Israeli regime against Palestinians.
The truce, negotiated by Qatar, Egypt, and the United States, took effect at 7:00 am (0500 GMT) on Friday, while Palestinians, who were sheltering for weeks at UNRWA schools and hospitals in southern Gaza, began leaving to go to their homes and check what has been left of them.
“One man said, ‘I want to go home and even if it is destroyed, I want to stay there. I want to die there’,” Al-Jazeera correspondent said.
“One woman with a child said, ‘I pray that these days will get longer and longer, to just feel safe for a day or two’.”
The truce agreement stipulates the release of Israeli criminals held in Gaza in exchange for Palestinian prisoners. The prisoner swap will take place later in the day. The ceasefire took effect after a night of intense Israeli bombardment.
A huge number of aid trucks are supposed to enter Gaza in these four days, according to Al Jazeera.
Israel launched the war on Gaza on October 7 after the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas waged the surprise Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the occupying entity in response to the Israeli regime’s decades-long campaign of bloodletting and devastation against Palestinians.
Tel Aviv has also blocked water, food, and electricity to Gaza, plunging the coastal strip into a humanitarian crisis.
The Government Media Office in Gaza said on Thursday that at least 14,854 Palestinians, including more than 6,150 children and 4,000 women, have been killed and over 36,000 others injured in the Israeli strikes.
Some 207 health workers and 65 Palestinians were among those killed.
That’s while 7,000 Palestinians are still missing.
According to the report, 60 percent of homes in Gaza have either been destroyed or damaged due to the aggression.
